True in the color verson there was not a big difference, but enough to make the logs look on the dull side and a little dark. With the channel mixer I was able to get the tone and brightness the way I wanted and have the logs pop out. I preferred the sky in color, I did not want to loose that little bit of orange.

I am still stumbling in PS but I took an overexposed image and an underexposed image and blended both together . I still need more practice on this process as I feel I could have done a better job.